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On March 16-18, 2018, the first annual Computational Law & Blockchain Festival will bring together coders, designers, lawyers, policymakers, researchers, and students from around the world to co-create the future of law, legal practice, and policymaking.

This global initiative will be a push to create and implement computational law and legal blockchain use cases. We will achieve this through a combination of educational sessions, hackathons, and policy discussions. In the spirit of decentralization, this entire event is hosted by independent, self-organized nodes around the world. Join us so you can LEARN, BUILD, and DISCUSS:

Festival

On March 16-18, 2018, the first annual Computational Law & Blockchain Festival will bring together coders, designers, lawyers, policymakers, researchers, and students from around the world to co-create the future of law, legal practice, and policymaking.

This global initiative will be a push to create and implement computational law and legal blockchain use cases. We will achieve this through a combination of educational sessions, hackathons, and policy discussions. In the spirit of decentralization, this entire event is hosted by independent, self-organized nodes around the world. Join us so you can LEARN, BUILD, and DISCUSS:

LEARN: New to computational law or blockchain technologies? Learn the basics from local and global experts at our educational sessions.

BUILD: Are you a coder or designer? Come test your hacking skills on one of our global challenges. Opportunities for local and global awards for winners!

DISCUSS: What’s the appropriate role of government in the blockchain ecosystem? Are ICOs securities offerings? What are the benefits and drawbacks of computational law for the legal system and society? How can we promote a welcoming and diverse blockchain community? Let’s discuss!

The Festival welcomes enthusiasts of all ages, genders, backgrounds, skill levels, and disciplines, and will be free to attend and participate.

#clbfest2018

Hosting a Node

General Information

Want to host a Festival Node? Great! We’re here to help. Hosting a festival node requires advanced planning and coordination to be successful. Consider reaching out to potential hosts as soon as possible. A successful node will have the following characteristics:

Venue: A location that can accommodate the expected number of attendees, with at least 3 rooms–one for each module. Rooms should have tables and chairs that enable learning, discussion, and collaboration, as well as power outlets for charging devices. Great event spaces could include: universities, co-working spaces, corporate offices, law firms, and dedicated community event spaces.

Audio/Visual: Great equipment is key to a successful node. Nodes should have A/V for presenters and Q&A (e.g., microphones, PA system, projector, screen) and A/V to record presentations to post online.
Connectivity: All nodes should provide free Wi-Fi connectivity for participants in order to allow participants to collaborate and share their hacks and ideas.

Refreshments: Nodes should provide adequate refreshments for attendees, including coffee/tea and snacks. If nodes do not also provide meals, there should be adequate time and nearby options for participants to buy their own food.
Code of Conduct: To ensure a welcoming and safe environment for all participants, a successful node will have a Code of Conduct regarding appropriate and inappropriate behavior during the Festival, with consequences for violations of the code.

Volunteers: A team to help with event setup and breakdown; participant sign-in; food and drinks; coordinating speakers; and answering questions. Consider having one volunteer for every 10 participants.

Sponsors: Hosting a weekend festival will require some institutional sponsors to help cover the costs of the event. If a sponsor is unable to provide monetary support, consider asking if they would be willing to provide venue space or “in-kind” contributions.
Partners: Don’t go it alone! Consider partnering with like-minded meetups, universities, and corporate partners to make your node as successful as it can be.

Local awards: Celebrate your local winners with awards and prizes!
To apply to host a node, please submit the following form by 2/1/2018: Google Form .

Project Tracks

TRACK 1: LEARN
Each node of the Computational Law & Blockchain Festival will include an educational track focused on education about blockchain and smart contracts and workshops for skill-building. While the specific educational sessions and workshops are up to each node, we recommend including the following for beginners:

Blockchain 101

The Cryptocurrency Ecosystem

Smart Contracts Workshop

Blockchain Law & Policy

We encourage you to find local experts to teach sessions in your node, but would be happy to make available educational resources if you do not have local experts in your community.

TRACK 2: BUILD
Each node of the Computational Law & Blockchain Festival will take part in our Global Challenge, a distributed, 24-hour hackathon that challenges participants to build open-source solutions in two substantive tracks:

Smart Contracts Challenge: This track asks participants to use open-source tools to build smart legal contracts addressing a range of common use cases and legal needs.

Blockchain for Legal Use Cases: This track asks participants to build blockchain-based tools for legal use cases, including digital identity, open legal data, fundraising, and more.

Hackathon participants will submit their solutions to a global repository for judging, with an opportunity for local and global awards and prizes for winning solutions.

For those not taking part in the Global Challenge, the Festival will also enable participants to take part in Partner Challenges, which ask participants to contribute to ongoing projects based on existing code. We will have more information on Partner Challenges soon.

TRACK 3: DISCUSS
Each note of the Computational Law & Blockchain Festival will take part in a Global Symposium addressing five core policy areas (and two questions within each) related to blockchain technologies and cryptocurrencies:

Taxation

Securities regulation

Anti-money laundering

Privacy & security

International money transfers

Each node will gather lawyers, policymakers, technologists, academics, and enthusiasts for a discussion of these issues, with the goal of contributing to a free and open global survey of those policy issues.

SUBSTANTIVE TRACK 1 - SMART LEGAL CONTRACTS

Name of Challenge

Description/Purpose - Use Case

Smart Contract Formation and Execution Challenge

Smart legal contracts can improve upon existing contracting practices by incorporating external data sources to provide real-time status about the performance of obligations and automating various legal, business, and operational practices such as giving notice of breach, issuing an invoice, and making payment. The challenge is to draft and execute a smart legal contract that is connected to data and software systems in order to address a legal or business problem in areas that may include supply chain, employment, professional services (including service levels), media/entertainment, fundraising, or real estate. Presented by the Accord Project and OpenLaw.

Smart Contract Dispute Resolution Challenge

Smart contracts face challenges–there are coding errors and security vulnerabilities; users will need to make changes, terminate contracts, and dispute transactions. Contracting parties will have disputes with different disputed amounts, in different industries, and with different sensitivities or concerns. The challenge is to define a type of dispute you believe will become prevalent in the smart contract space and create a dispute resolution solution or process for smart contract users of that type. The solution will sit on an infrastructure-level dispute resolution marketplace. Challenge presented by Bootstrap Legal.

SUBSTANTIVE TRACK 2 - BLOCKCHAIN FOR LEGAL USE CASES

Name of Challenge

Description/Purpose - Use Case

Digital Identity Challenge

Develop a solution to enable enforceable blockchain-based digital signatures to grant or revoke consent and authorization for electronic transactions on the open web.

LawChain Challenge

Develop a killer blockchain app to liberate law as verifiable, standard open data may also hold the key to render law understandable and usable by people, groups and organizations.

Small Business Crowdfunding Challenge

Develop open toolkits for companies, lawyers and developers using blockchain technology to make crowdfunding cheaper, easier and more useful for local businesses.This challenge continues the project https://github.com/ngk2017/ncfunderhack. Activities include: (1) Policy, systemic and legal issue development suitable for lawyers of any technical skill level. (2) Legal operations specifications development: what are the critical blockchain solutions that will enable small business crowdfunding? (3) Coding a “thing” small businesses can use: we will build CryptoKitties-style “aliens” while exploring legal significance of the game functions.